Archive for the 'Federal Races' Category

Let’s see, 18 candidates are seeking the seat currently held by Republican Senator Norm Coleman. But none of them is Jesse Ventura, who told Larry King he didn’t intend to run and kept his word. The Green Party has no candidate.

Will Jesse Ventura run as an independent in the Minnesota race for the U.S. Senate? Guess we’ll find out tonight, when he appears on “Larry King Live.” Thanks to Lew Rockwell for this posting in which he says:

Jesse Ventura, the former professional wrestler and successful Reform Party candidate for governor of Minnesota, is thinking of entering the U.S. Senate race against incumbent Republican Norm Coleman as well as Democratic nominee Al Franken.

He has to decide by tomorrow, July 15, since that’s the deadline for filing for the race.

In his latest dispatch, independent congressional candidate John Murphy quotes from comedian George Carlin and country-western singer Merle Haggard to show it’s not always accurate to classify someone as merely “conservative” or “liberal,” “Left” or “Right.” He also discusses “The Weimarization of the Working Class.”

John Murphy is the independent candidate for House of Representatives [...]

St. Louis – Voters normally expect a certain amount of hot air from
politicians, but Libertarian congressional candidate Thomas L. Knapp
announced this morning that he intends to cool things down by running
a “carbon-neutral” campaign.

Dan Billings, a Republican, says this in an op-ed in the Kennebunk (Maine) Morning Sentinel:

During the controversy after the 2000 presidential election, Democrats cried “count every vote.” Unsuccessful with that strategy, the Maine Democratic Party is now trying to limit the choices Maine voters see on their ballots.

At the last moment a member of the Green Party, Richard Carroll, filed to campaign against former Rep. Dwayne Dobbins of North Little Rock. Dobbins stepped down from the legislature in 2005 after prosecutors said he fondled a 17-year-old girl. There is no Republican on the ballot, so Carroll is Dobbins’ only opponent.

Portland – (June 7, 2008) – At its first summer nominating convention in Portland on June 7, 2008, the Pacific Green Party voted to apportion 23 of its 24 alloted delegates to this year’s national Green Party presidential nominating convention to former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney. McKinney left the Democratic Party because if its numerous failures on peace and justice issues, most prominently its failure to end the war in Iraq. She is the odds-on favorite to win the nomination at the convention to be held July 10-13 in Chicago.

http://www.runcynthiarun.org
http://www.gp.org

The PGP also nominated Congressional candidates for its Peace Slate:

In the 2nd district, the PGP nominated Dr. Tristin Mock to challenge incumbent Greg Walden, a staunch supporter of the Bush war policy. Mock is a naturopathic physician who grew up in The Dalles. She has already been active campaigning through the vast 2nd Congressional District, which covers all of Oregon east of the Cascades, as well as southern counties such as Jackson.

http://www.votemock.com

In the 3rd District, the PGP nominated Michael Meo to challenge incumbent Democrat Earl Blumenauer, who has angered progressives in his east-side Portland district by supporting funding for the Irag war, as well as free-trade deals such as CAFTA. In fact, Joe Walsh, Blumenauer’s challenger in the Democratic primary, has endorsed Meo in the general election. Meo has tremendous credibility as an anti-war candidate, having served to years in prison as a Vietnam War draft resister. He is the chair of the mathematics department at Benson Polytechnic High School in Portland.

http://www.meoforcongress.org

In the 4th District, the PGP nominated Mike Beilstein to challenge incumbent Peter DeFazio, whose inconsistent record on Iraq includes votes to fund the war. Beilstein is a sitting member of the Corvallis City Council, and is the architect of the PGP’s Peace Slate strategy. He devotes a month of every summer to travel to Cuba with Pastors for Peace to defy the US trade and travel embargo. He is an active member of Committees of Correspondence for Democracy and Socialism and Citizens for Global Solutions.

http://www.newmenu.org/mikebeilsteinforcongress

In the 5th District, the PGP nominated Alex Polikoff for the seat being vacated by Democratic Congresswoman Darlene Hooley. Like McKinney, Polikoff recently left the Democratic Party after it took over Congress in 2006 and yet failed totally to end the war in Iraq. Polikoff is an electrical engineer in Corvallis. He decries the fact that both major parties seem more concerned with getting elected and appeasing their corporate donors than dealing with the threat of our ballooning public debt, job and health insecurity, world instability, the energy crisis and global warming.

http://www.votepolikoff.org

In addition to the Peace Slate candidates, the PGP also nominated Seth Woolley for Oregon Secretary of State. A software engineer, Woolley will focus on the concerns generated by electronic voting machines, and is an advocate for electoral reforms such as preference voting also known as instant runoff voting. Although preference voting is authorized by Oregon Constitution Article 2, Section 16, Democratic Secretary of State Bill Bradbury and his Elections Division head John Linback have aggressively worked to undermine attempts in Eugene, Ashland, and the Oregon Legislature to implement this constitutional provision.

http://seth4sos.org/

The PGP nominated Chris Extine for the 42nd district in the Oregon House of Representive, which covers inner southeast Portland. Chris is a math teacher in the Portland Public Schools.

The PGP will hold a follow-up nominating convention on August 16 in Oregon City. In addition to filling out the Peace Slate with 1st Congressional District and U.S. Senate candidates, the PGP anticipates nominating candidates to other statewide offices, seats in the Oregon Legislature, and other local partisan offices.

Three years ago Democratic Rep. Dwayne Dobbins resigned from his U.S. House seat to settle a felony sexual assault charge of fondling a 17-year-old girl. He pleaded guilty to misdemeanor harassment in a plea bargain.

Now he’s back. In March he unexpectedly filed to run for his old seat, and he has no opponents [...]

Jerome Pohlen is the Green Party’s candidate for the U.S. House seat in the 3rd District of Illinois. According to Green Party Watch, he is also author of Progressive Nation: A travel guide with 400-plus inspiring landmarks and left turns, which he is promoting on the campaign trail.

Jason Wallace, the Green Party candidate in the 11th Congressional District of Illinois, says he will spend just $10,000 on his campaign, a tiny fraction of what Republican Marty Ozinga and Democrat Debbie Halvorson will spend. That’s a cap only on expenditures, he explains. If he raises more money than that, he will [...]